May 31, 2008

During an appearance at a Long Island bookstore last month, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich was asked by a member of the audience why the United States has not been hit again since 9/11.

"I honestly don’t know," Gingrich replied. "I would have expected another attack. I was very, very worried … when we had the sniper attacks, because the sniper attacks were psychologically so frightening. … I was amazed that the bad guys didn’t figure out how to send ten or twelve sniper teams."

"This is … one of the great tragedies of the Bush administration," Gingrich continued. "The more successful they’ve been at intercepting and stopping bad guys, the less proof there is that we’re in danger. And therefore, the better they’ve done at making sure there isn’t an attack, the easier it is to say, ‘Well, there never was going to be an attack anyway.’ And it’s almost like they should every once in a while have allowed an attack to get through just to remind us."

Gingrich then recommended splitting the FBI into a domestic crime unit, which would respect civil liberties, and a "small but very aggressive anti-terrorism agency" with "extraordinary ability to eavesdrop."

"I think that your liberties in a domestic setting are paramount," Gingrich explained. "I would rather risk crime than risk losing my civil liberties. But I would not rather risk a nuclear weapon. … I think the greatest danger to our liberty is to actually have the country end up in the kind of attack that would lead us to favor a dictatorship for security."

This video is from C-SPAN 2, broadcast April 29, 2008. The full video can be viewed here.

You probably didn't hear about the House voting to ban Pentagon propaganda -- since the networks have failed to cover the story.

You probably didn't hear about the House voting to ban Pentagon propaganda last Thursday -- since the television networks have once again conveniently failed to cover the story.

But in a surprise move, a 2009 defense policy bill passed with an amendment, sponsored by Rep. Paul Hodes (D-N.H.), that outlaws the Defense Department from engaging in "a concerted effort to propagandize" the American people. The measure would also force an investigation by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) into efforts to plant positive news stories about the war in U.S. media.

An April 20 front-page New York Times article first reported how the Pentagon cultivated and coached more than 75 former military officers who became regulars on Fox News, CNN, the broadcast networks, and even NPR. One week later, the Pentagon announced that it would suspend the "briefing" program pending an internal review, which is continuing. On May 13, watchdog Media Matters documented that analysts in the Pentagon's program appeared or were quoted in major outlets more than 4,500 times.

If the Senate also passes the propaganda ban, it will send a strong message to the Pentagon and other government agencies that the Congress will not allow the continued manipulation of public opinion.

But let's not forget that this is just the most recent major government propaganda revelation in recent years. In March 2005, the New York Times revealed that several federal agencies were producing fake "video news releases" that local television stations aired as if they were bona fide news reports.

Two months before that, several "payola pundits" were discovered to be receiving lucrative government PR contracts to opine in favor of Bush administration policies -- without disclosing their financial arrangement. Armstrong Williams was the poster-child, with his $240,000 contract from the Department of Education to promote the president's "No Child Left Behind Act."

It is crucial to understand that with or without the Pentagon's program, there will always be well-credentialed analysts pushing to get on the air who are eager to toe the administration's line for fame, ideology or money. And the right is historically much better at training them and getting them in front of cameras.

But at the end of the day, it is the television newsroom producers and "bookers" - and the executives who hire them -- who decide who gets on TV and who doesn't. And the vast majority of them consistently turn to government officials, major politicians and party insiders. They seldom turn to dissenting voices, critical public interest advocates and fierce critics of government policy.

On May 5, MSNBC's Chris Matthews revealed that "all my bosses [were] … basically pro-war during the war. … and I was up against that." Again, a major revelation ignored by most of the press that explains the culture that subsumed every major network newsroom.

On Friday, the GAO said it had already begun looking into the program and would provide a legal opinion. On the same day, the inspector general's office at the Defense Department also announced that it would investigate the Pentagon program.

The House spending bill will be taken up by the Senate after next week's recess, and legislators will have to insert a similar amendment. The White House has threatened to veto the entire bill, citing concerns with several provisions.

Congress should hold high-profile hearings to get to the bottom of the Pentagon program and force the issue into the news. If the networks won't cover it, at least C-SPAN will.

Two things are certain. First, consolidated, corporate media is failing to provide critical journalism, and is aiding and abetting government propaganda. Second, this is not the last time this media blight will rear its ugly head, and as long as it does, the American public will continue to be led by the nose to support disastrous wars, policies and politicians.

May 29, 2008 | Richard L. Armitage, who served from 2001 to 2005 as Deputy Secretary of State, was a rarity in the Bush administration: an official who delighted in talking to the press. Reporters loved him for his withering criticism of the neoconservative zealots around President George W. Bush and in part because he fed them tidbits about the White House they could obtain nowhere else. His accidental disclosure to conservative columnist Robert Novak that Valerie Plame, the wife of Iraq war critic Joseph Wilson, was working undercover for the Central Intelligence Agency remains one of the most notorious leaks of the Bush era.

But perhaps because of his cozy ties to the Washington press corps and the media's obsession with Plamegate, very little has been written about Armitage's extensive business dealings. In fact, Armitage is one of the most successful capitalists in Washington. He has successfully parlayed his experience in covert operations and secret diplomacy into a thriving career as a consultant and adviser to some of the biggest players in America's Intelligence Industrial Complex -- corporations that are working at the heart of U.S. national security and profiting handsomely from it.

Armitage, currently an adviser to presidential candidate John McCain, had once been Colin Powell's closest ally during the bitter disputes inside the Bush administration over the invasion and occupation of Iraq. According to the Washington Post's Bob Woodward, Armitage advised Powell on more than one occasion to tell the neocons to "go fuck themselves," and, at one point, even refused to deliver a speech about Iraq drafted for him by Vice President Dick Cheney's office.

Yet, three years after those epic battles, Armitage is enjoying life as a stakeholder in a dozen private companies that are making money directly from the war started by his former nemeses.

Over the past decade, contracting for America's spy agencies has grown into a $50 billion industry that eats up seven of every 10 dollars spent by the U.S. government on its intelligence services. Today, unbeknownst to most Americans, agencies once renowned for their prowess in analysis, covert operations, electronic surveillance and overhead reconnaissance outsource many of their core tasks to the private sector. The bulk of this market is serviced by about 100 companies, ranging in size from multibillion dollar defense behemoths to small technology shops funded by venture capitalists.

Nearly every one of them has sought out former high-ranking intelligence and national security officials as both managers and directors. Like Armitage, these are people who have served for decades in the upper echelons of national power. Their lives have been defined by secret briefings, classified documents, covert wars and sensitive intelligence missions. Many of them have kept their security clearances and maintain a hand in government by serving as advisers to high-level advisory bodies at the Pentagon, the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency and the White House. Now, with their government careers behind them, they make their living by rendering strategic advice to the dozens of information technology vendors and intelligence contractors headquartered along the banks of the Potomac River and the byways of Washington's Beltway.

Ever since the 1950s, with the rise of America's modern military-industrial complex, high-level U.S. officials and military men have moved between the government and private sectors. But what we have today with the intelligence business is something far more systemic: senior officials leaving their national security and counterterrorism jobs for positions where they are basically doing the same jobs they once held at the CIA, the NSA and other agencies -- but for double or triple the salary, and for profit. It's a privatization of the highest order, in which our collective memory and experience in intelligence -- our crown jewels of spying, so to speak -- are owned by corporate America. Yet, there is essentially no government oversight of this private sector at the heart of our intelligence empire. And the lines between public and private have become so blurred as to be nonexistent.

Shortly after leaving government in 2005, Armitage was recruited to the board of directors of ManTech International, a $1.7 billion corporation that does extensive work for the National Security Agency and other intelligence collection agencies. He's also since advised two private equity funds with significant holdings in intelligence enterprises. Veritas Capital, where Armitage served as a senior adviser from 2005 to 2007, owns intelligence consultant McNeil Technologies Inc. and DynCorp International, an important security contractor in Iraq. For a time, Veritas also owned MZM, Inc., the CIA and defense intelligence contractor that was caught -- before the Veritas acquisition -- bribing former Republican Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham.

In 2007, Armitage, along with several Veritas executives, moved over to DC Capital Partners, an intelligence-oriented buyout firm with some $200 million in assets. One of its first acquisitions after Armitage came on board was Omen Inc., a Maryland company that provides information technology and consulting services to the NSA. The fund has since combined Omen with two other intelligence contractors to form a new company called National Interests Security Company LLC, which has 850 employees, more than half of them holding top secret or higher security clearances.

Through his own eponymous consulting firm, Armitage has lobbied on behalf of L-3 Communications Inc., one of the nation's largest intelligence contractors, to help it sell anti-submarine surveillance systems to Taiwan. L-3, like ManTech, is also heavily involved in Iraq. (Further topping off Armitage's investment interests in the war: He sits on the board of directors of ConocoPhillips, which is aiming to become a major player in Iraq's energy industry through a joint venture with Russia's Lukoil.)

In these jobs, former high-level officials like Armitage continue to fight terrorist threats and protect the "homeland," as they once did while working in government. But by fusing their political careers with business, these former officials have brought money-making into the highest reaches of national security. They have created a new class of capitalist policy-makers that is bridging the gap between public policy and private business in ways that are unprecedented in American history.

Who profits from the Iraq war? More than a quarter of senators and congressmen have invested at least $196 million of their own money in companies doing business with the Department of Defense (DoD) that profit from the death and destruction in Iraq.

According to the latest reports, 151 members of Congress invested close to a quarter-billion in companies that received defense contracts of at least $5 million in 2006. These companies got more than $275.6 billion from the government in 2006, or $755 million per day, according to FedSpending.org, a website of the watchdog group OMBWatch.

Congressmen gave themselves a loophole so they only have to report their assets in broad ranges. Thus, they can be off as much as 160 percent. (Try giving the IRS an estimate like that.) In 2004, the first full year after the present Iraq war began, Republican and Democratic lawmakers-both hawks and doves-invested between $74.9 million and $161.3 million in companies under contract with the DoD. In 2006 Democrats had at least $3.7 million invested in the defense sector alone, compared to the Republicans’ "only" $577,500. As the war raged on, so did the billions of profits-and personal investments by Congress members in war contractors, which increased 5 percent from 2004 to 2006.

Investments in these contractors yielded Congress members between $15.8 million and $62 million in personal income from 2004 through 2006, through dividends, capital gains, royalties and interest. Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.), who are two of Congress’s wealthiest members, were among the lawmakers who garnered the most income from war contractors between 2004 and 2006: Sensenbrenner got at least $3.2 million and Kerry reaped at least $2.6 million.

Members of the Senate Foreign Relations and Armed Services committees which oversee the Iraq war had between $32 million and $44 million invested in companies with DoD contracts.

War hawk Sen. Joe Lieberman (IConn.), chairman of the defense-relatedSenate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, had at least $51,000 invested in these companies in 2006.

Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.), who voted for Bush’s war, had stock in defense companies, such as Honeywell, Boeing and Raytheon, but sold the stock in May 2007.

Of the 151 members whose investments are tied to the "defense" (war)industry, as far as we know, not one of them offered to donate their bloodstained profits to the national treasury to offset the terrible debt they have imposed. Has one of them even offered to donate one cent of their war profits to lessen the debt that increases more than $1 million a minute?

When our boys and girls are wounded the government bills them to return their reenlistment bonus. They have to return any pay they received while they were hospitalized. They have to pay for their helmets and uniforms that are destroyed in the hell of war. But they keep on fighting for these politicians’ right to keep their war profits.

There never was an exit stategy only lies & war profits. While they profit we pay in higher taxes, cut services & higher gas prices.

We now have an exit strategy & it is called: General Strike 9/11/08.

"Sooner or later all freedom loving Americans will realize that the only way to stop those who would bleed our nation dry, dismantle our constitution, and dissolve our national sovereignty is to say I will not work for you, buy from you, fight for you, or die for you, until the criminals are gone from the halls of our government."

Dr. Carroll Quigley, a highly respected professor of history at the Foreign Service School of Georgetown University for 28-years, revealed in his 1348 page magnum opus, Tragedy and Hope (1966), the nefarious goal of Cecil Rhodes’ secret society calling for an American Union, coming to fruition today as the “North American Union.” From 1884 to about 1915, according Dr. Quigley, the members of The Rhodes Secret Society exhaustively worked at extending the British Empire and forming a federal system. The Rhodes Secret Society was “constantly harping on the lessons to be learned from the failure of the American Revolution and the success of the Canadian federation of 1867, and hoped to federate the various parts of the empire as seemed feasible, then confederate the whole of it, with the United Kingdom, into a single organization…(hoping) to bring the United States into this organization to whatever degree was possible…(making) Washington the capital of the whole organization or allow parts of the empire to become states of the American Union (emphasis added. Below see scan copy of page 133 of Tragedy and Hope).”

It is interesting to note that, despite an aversion by The Rhodes Secret Society towards the success of our American Revolution accentuating a victory for sovereignty and freedom predicated upon a Constitutional Republic, the Rhodes Secret Society was willing to adhere to diplomacy by deception in order to confederate independent nations into a single federation or union disregarding the sovereignty of nations. Diplomacy by deception continues to be adhered to by the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) under the patronage and guidance of the Rockefellers. It is of utmost importance to understand the deeply rooted genesis in the world of foreign affairs as the Royal Institute for International Affairs (RIIA) headquartered at Chatham House, St. James Square, London, is the “mother” of the American Council of Foreign Relations (CFR).

Dr. Quigley attributes the success of The Rhodes Secret Society to their effectiveness in concealing its existence. Its members’ preference was to maintain a stealthy appearance with a series of overlapping circles or rings partly concealed by being hidden behind formally organized groups of no obvious political significance and avoiding an appearance of being an integrated group. Dr. Quigley provides a lengthy roster and structure of A Tentative Roster of the Milner Group in the “Appendix” of his book, The Anglo-American Establishment. The “front organization” for The Rhodes Secret Society was The Round Table Group in Great Britain which was working in concert with J. P. Morgan in the United States to establish its “front organization” in the United States. Dr. Quigley described the genesis of the Council on Foreign Relations as follows:

At the end of the war of 1914, it became clear that the organization of this system had to be greatly extended. . . . Lionel Curtis . . . established, in England and each dominion, a front organization to the existing local Round Table Group…This front organization, called the Royal Institute of International Affairs, had as its nucleus in each area the existing submerged Round Table Group…in New York it was known as the Council on Foreign Relations, and was a front for J. P. Morgan and Company in association with the very small American Round Table Group. The American organizers were dominated by the large number of Morgan ‘experts’… The Round Table for years (until 1961) was edited from the back door of Chatham House grounds in Ormond Yard, and its telephone came through the Chatham House switchboard (Tragedy and Hope: 951-952).

“Stealth” is the preferred “modus operandi” practiced by The Rhodes Secret Society, Royal Institute for International Affairs (RIIA), and the Council of Foreign Relations (CFR) in establishing the European Union (EU), the North American Community (AKA: North American Union – NAU), and last week’s Union of South American Nations (UNASUR). “Stealth” has enabled them to manipulate the American people by keeping us ignorant, uninformed, and confused from the days of Cecil Rhodes to today. Dr. Quigley described the manipulation of such tactics over our American political process visa-via the false left vs. right paradigm:

The chief problem of American political life for along time has been how to make the two Congressional parties more national and international…(therefore) argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to doctrinaire and academic thinkers…Instead the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can ‘throw the rascals out’ at any election without leading to any profound or extensive shifts in policy (Tragedy and Hope: 1247-1248).

Such stealthy underhanded tactics have always been the means to an end, including but not limited to the eradication of the sovereignty of independent nations in order to achieve their ultimate goal of establishing a one world government, transcending from the inception of The Rhodes Secret Society to The Round Table Group in Great Britain to Royal Institute for International Affairs (RIIA), and the Council of Foreign Relations (CFR). Tragedy and Hope took Dr. Quigley over twenty years of researching the coveted archives of Cecil Rhodes secret society. Dr. Quigley dedicated his career “to training undergraduates in techniques of historical analysis which will help them to free their understanding of history from the accepted categories and cognitive classifications of the society in which we live, since these, however necessary they…nevertheless do often serve as barriers which shield us from recognition of the underlying realities themselves (Tragedy and Hope: ix).”

Dr. Quigley had a profound influence on numerous future diplomats and government officials. Amongst these individuals included former President Bill Clinton who commended Quigley during his Democratic Presidential Nomination Acceptance Address stating “as a teenager, I heard John Kennedy’s summons to citizenship…then, as a student at Georgetown I head that call clarified by a professor name Carol Quigley, who said to us that America was the greatest nation in history because our people had always believed in two things: that tomorrow can be better than today and that every one of us has a personal moral responsibility to make it so (http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/wjclinton1992dnc.htm).” Clinton specifically referenced Dr. Quigley in his autobiography, Bill Clinton- My Life, when he wrote, “Quigley’s insights had a particularly lasting impact… (so) from the 1992 campaign through my two terms in office, I quoted Professor Quigley’s line often (Clinton: 77-78).”

According to Dr. Quigley, “ by the middle 1890’s Rhodes had a personal income of at least a million pounds sterling a year (then about five million dollars) which was spent so freely for his mysterious purposes…his desire to federate the English-speaking peoples and to bring all the habitable portions of the world under their control…leaving part of his great fortune to fund the Rhodes Scholarships at Oxford in order to spread the English ruling class tradition throughout the English-speaking world as (his mentor Professor at Oxford) Ruskin had wanted (Tragedy and Hope: 130-131).” It is interesting to note that former President Bill Clinton was a recipient of Rhodes Scholarship in 1968 along with extremely powerful and prominent individuals from predominantly the two political party paradigm including but not limited to Dean Rusk in 1931, U.S. Secretary of State, 1961-1969, in 1951 Richard N. Gardner U.S. Ambassador and CFR Director, in 1968 Strobe Talbott, American diplomat U.S. Deputy Secretary of State (1994-2001) and Time Magazine Editor-at-Large, Foreign Affairs journalist and President of the Brookings Institution, and in 1973 Richard N. Haass President of the Council on Foreign Relations and Director of the Policy Planning Staff at the U.S. Department of State, 2001-2003 (http://www.americanrhodes.org/). All of these individuals are members of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Dr. Quigley exposed their matrix of complete control over individuals and society:

It is increasingly clear that, in the twentieth century, the expert will replace … the democratic voter in control of the political system. Hopefully, the elements of choice and freedom may survive for the ordinary individual in that he may be free to make a choice between two opposing political groups (even if these groups have little policy choice within the parameters of policy established by the experts) and he may have the choice to switch his economic support from one large unit to another. But, in general, his freedom and choice will be controlled within very narrow alternatives by the fact that he will be numbered from birth and followed, as a number, through his educational training, his required military or other public service, his tax contributions, his health and medical requirements, and his final retirement and death benefits (Tragedy and Hope: 866).

Perhaps, this is the reason why a third party candidate has never won a presidential election in the history of the United States. Just as importantly, Dr. Quigley attested to the forces that have controlled and continue to control England and the United States:

The Liberal Party was not so closely controlled as was the Conservative Party, but its chief leaders were on intimate relations of friendship and cooperation with the Cecil Rhodes crowd… which was especially true of Lord Rosebery, who was prime minister in 1894-1895, and H. H. Asquith, who was prime minister in 1905-1915. Asquith married Margot Tennant . . . in 1894, and had Balfour as his chief witness at the ceremony. . . . In later years Balfour was the closest friend of the Asquiths even when they were leaders of two opposing parties (Tragedy and Hope: 475).…(likewise) There does exist, and has existed for a generation, an international Anglophile network which operates, to some extent, in the way the … Right believes the Communists act. In fact, this network, which we may identify as the Round Table Groups, has no aversion to cooperating with the Communists, or any other groups, and frequently does so…I know of the operations of this network because I have studied it for twenty years and was permitted for two years, in the early 1960’s, to examine its papers and secret records. I have no aversion to it or to most of its aims…but in general my chief difference of opinion is that it wishes to remain unknown, and I believe its role in history is significant enough to be known (Tragedy and Hope: 950).

Dr. Quigley taught at Harvard where he received his undergraduate degrees and his doctorate. He also taught at Princeton and at the Industrial College of the Armed Forces in 1951. Moreover, he also taught in Africa at the Brookings Institution in 1961, and lectured at many other places, including the U.S. Naval Weapons Laboratory, the Foreign Service Institute of the State Department, and the Naval College at Norfolk, Virginia. In 1958, Dr. Quigley was both a consultant to the Congressional Select Committee that established the national space agency. Also, he was a collaborator in history to the Smithsonian Institution after 1957 assisting in the establishment of the Museum of History and Technology and in the summer of 1964 he served at the Navy Post-Graduate School in Monterey, California, as consultant to “Project Seabed,” a visualization and future design program of what American weapons systems would like in the 1970’s. In short, Dr. Quigley’s Circum Vitae is unequivocally scholarly, impressive, and indicative of the confidence by the Eastern Establishment and the security clearance from both the United States government during the Cold War.

Dr. Quigley’s Tragedy and Hope is loaded with far more revelations than this article can possibly cover here. However, Dr. Quigley’s provocative revelations may account for his “fall from grace” amongst the circles of the intellectual elite, the British Establishment, and the American Eastern Establishment all of which had trusted him to the extent of allowing him to access to their most coveted archives and inner workings. In fact, a few thousand copies of Tragedy and Hope were sold prior to the “accidental destruction” of the plates in an attempt to suppress subsequent editions from being printed according to a taped interview discovered in Quigley’s archives at Georgetown University by Dr. Stanley Montieth (http://www.radioliberty.com/newbkvd.htm).

Exposing the truth about their nefarious “Great Plan, the Great Work, the Lost Word” is the most effective weapon each and every American patriot must utilize in restoring our Constitutional Republic.

May 28, 2008

‘Global governance’ in our vocabulary does not imply a global 'government', but rather the institution set up for cooperation, coordination, and common action between durable sovereign states…people and nations are beginning to agree To take the next steps together. They are reaching a consensus by practical procedures rather than by the formal voting of governmental representatives; many International functions, especially those requiring the most foresight and operational flexibility, and be carried out through non governmental arrangements. –Club of Rome

Our government and a myriad of multinational corporations have decided that we aren’t informed enough to make the decisions that affect our world. We the people have allowed the government to essentially go into ‘cruise control’. While the majority of Americans slumber our nation is being transformed and the governmental power structure has been taken out of the hands of elected officials. The true power is being wielded by non-governmental organizations. Under the auspices of the United Nations numerous NGOs have amassed enormous power and influence. These loosely organized groups have no responsibility to report to the American people and that is how they have operated unmolested.

Nation-states are having to share their power with new global actors: international (or more accurately 'inter-governmental') organizations (such as the United Nations), transnational corporations, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs)…NGOs survive the fads and fashions of governments; they outlive the terms of elected governments. They provide a continuity of care and a continued focus on social justice issues when governments might prefer to ignore those issues…NGOs show that governments no longer have a monopoly over information and ideas. [1]–Keith SuterThe Club of Rome in their document, “The First Global Revolution” preaches to their choir about the weaknesses of democracy and how voting is passé. NGOs and think-tanks such as the CFR come to a consensus on a particular subject then government officials push forward their agendas with glee as their influence is undeniable. These bureaucrats who are nothing more than mockingbirds and parrots are invited to join these organizations and partake in the discussions in order to see that the most important goals are met. Many of the more prestigious organizations are blatantly against national sovereignty and outright fund genocidal operations around the globe.

The common enemy of humanity is Man. In searching for a common enemy against whom we can unite, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like, would fit the bill. In their totality and their interactions these phenomena do constitute a common threat which must be confronted by everyone together. –Club of Rome, The First Global RevolutionJohn D. Rockefeller III was an exemplar and a leader of this second population control movement, 1 whose primary concern was less the well-being of individuals than of entire societies, a well-being that, in the view of these neo-Malthusians, was threatened by a growing imbalance between human numbers and a wide variety of natural and other resources, including food supplies. –World Bank, Global Family Planning Revolution [2]Many of the early advocates of birth control, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States, came from the eugenics movement, which was quite strong in both countries in the early decades of the 20th century. That movement had a certain intellectual respectability until the horrors Nazi Germany perpetrated in the name of racial policies destroyed it. –World Bank, Global Family Planning Revolutionthe World Bank was actively seeking to make loans for population projects; and the United Nations (UN) had agreed to create a fund, the UN Fund for Population Activities (today known simply as the UN Population Fund, although it retains its original acronym, UNFPA). Developing countries were coming under fairly intense pres-sure, particularly from the U.S. government, to adopt population policies and to mount family planning programs. –World Bank, Global Family Planning Revolution.

We are actively being manipulated on a grand scale. Many people believe fighting global warming is a noble cause and that having an abortion is being ‘earth friendly’. Global warming is a farce; it is nothing more than a method to bring you under neo-feudalism. Family planning is a means to ensure that the numbers of ‘useless eaters’ are reduced and that their bloodlines live on to rule for generations. You would never hear of any family connected to the British Aristocracy having an abortion.Global governance is about a varied cast of actors: people acting together in formal and informal ways, in communities and countries, within sectors and across them, in non governmental bodies and citizens' movements, and both nationally and internationally, as a global civil society. And it is through people that other actors play their roles: states and governments of states, regions and alliances in formal or informal garb. But we also noted that a vital and central role in global governance falls to people coming together in the United Nations, aspiring to fulfill some of their highest goals through its potential for common action. [3]–Our Global Neighborhood, The Commission On Global Governance

The multinational corporations and non-governmental organizations are lording over us and economic and hemispheric integration is the talk today. We are moving towards a world economic and judicial system as nations are being fused together by working groups like the Security and Prosperity Partnership and the Organization of American States. The end game is to produce an unholy amalgamation in a shotgun wedding fashion with all the governmental responsibilities of all nations being relegated to NGOs and other organizations. Our birthright of common law will be taken away from us and replaced with Napoleonic code [4]that makes nearly everything illegal and you have to get permission from the ruling body to do anything. That is the neo-colonialism or neo-feudalism that transforms free men and women back into slaves on a global plantation.The most formal initiative aimed at bringing judges together is the recently inaugurated Organization of the Supreme Courts of the Americas. Twenty -five Supreme Court justices or their designees met in Washington in October 1995 and drafted the OCSA charter, dedicating the organization to "promoting and strengthening judicial independence and the rule of law among the members, as well as the proper constitutional treatment of the judiciary as a fundamental branch of the state." The charter calls for triennial meetings and envisages a permanent secretariat. It required ratification by 15 supreme courts, achieved in spring 1996. An initiative by judges, for judges, it is not a stretch to say that OCSA is the product of judicial foreign policy. –Foreign Affairs, The Real New World Order.

The point is that the limitation of national sovereignty for the purpose of participating in higher unions, to secure the common defense and promote the general welfare, is not unprecedented but rather is quite widely recognized in the fundamental constitutions of numerous states. All members of the European Union, except Britain (which has no written constitution), have made similar provisions for the limitation of their sovereignty in order to participate in a higher union, as have states once or prospectively in other regional federations. [5]–Joseph Baratta, The Politics Of World Federation.Instead of stressing independence our leaders are moving towards interdependence. If you use the European Union [6]for example you will see that the member nations have no autonomy and their nation state leaders are powerless. All the power resides in Brussels and the heads of each nation in the union are just window dressing. In order to restore our constitution we must become the government, there doesn’t seem to be any other way. Let’s take back our country starting from your local county all the way to Washington D.C. If we are the government then we can give Congress a spine once again and all agreements that have not been ratified by Congress are invalid and the non-governmental organizations are forced to go back to their origins, bullying the third world. Eighty percent of the population isn’t going to do anything to save this republic if they are not directly affected by these policies. Twenty percent will be moved to act and we need people who are willing to stand for limited government and individual liberty to run for anything from dogcatcher to mayor to President of the United States. When people with this mindset are put in positions they can make a real difference in the communities. Don’t be afraid to stand out and let your voice be heard. When you do there will always be people out there who think the very same way you do. Be an example to people in your community and then even the sheep will follow you. Slowly but surely the group think and social constructs will be broken.Bureaucracy is a giant mechanism operated by pygmies. – Honore de BalzacMichael Vail1. Keith Suter. Globalization and the new world order. 2006 [cited; Available from: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2242/is_1683_288/ai_n18791396/print]2. World Bank. Global Family Planning Revolution. 2007 [cited; Available from: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTPRH/Resources/GlobalFamilyPlanningRevolution.pdf]3. GDRC. Our Global Neighborhood [cited; Available from: http://www.gdrc.org/u-gov/global-neighbourhood/index.htm]4. Slate. Louisiana's Napoleon Complex. 2005 [cited; Available from: http://www.slate.com/id/2126126/]5. Joseph Baratta. The Politics Of World Federation. 2005 [cited; Available from: http://www.humiliationstudies.org/documents/BarattaIntroductionWorldFederalism.pdf]6. The Spectator. Now it's blasphemy to mock Europe. 2000 [cited; Available from: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3724/is_200011/ai_n8923307/print]

There is a little known law that the public should be very shocked to know exists. It is the Public Duty Doctrine. It is a U.S. common law that states, there is no general duty to come to the rescue of another. Generally, a person cannot be held liable for doing nothing while another person is in peril.

However, such a duty may arise in two situations:

A duty to rescue arises where a person creates a hazardous situation. If another person then falls into peril because of this hazardous situation, the creator of the hazard — who may not necessarily have been a negligent tortfeasor — has a duty to rescue the individual in peril.[4]

You will notice, if you look closely, that emergency workers are only required to have a general duty to rescue the public within the scope of their employment, but not a duty to specificindividuals. Yet if a police officer requests your help you are required by law to help them.

In 1855 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that there is no right to police protection and no right to sue over its lack there of. South v Maryland, 59 U.S. (How) 396; 15 L. Ed. 433 (1855)

Another example of this is in McCloskey v Mueller III. On July 23, 2001, Gary Lee Sampson telephoned the Boston office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and spoke with an FBI employee, William H. Anderson. Sampson explained to Anderson that he was in Abington, Massachusetts; that he was wanted for armed robbery; and that he wished to surrender to the authorities. Anderson disconnected the call either accidentally or purposely — the amended complaint contemplates both possibilities — and made no attempt to reconnect it, investigate it, or report it to any other law enforcement officer.Sampson never called back; instead, after spending several hours fruitlessly awaiting the FBI's arrival in Abington, he embarked upon a "killing spree." The spree began the next day when Sampson abducted and murdered a complete stranger, Philip McCloskey. Before local authorities finally apprehended him on July 31, Sampson had killed two other men as well. The three peoples estates sued but the court ruled that the FBI had no duty to the victims.

So if the police have no duty to protect you, who are you to rely on? The answer is simple. It is yourself. The next time someone thinks its a good idea to outlaw all guns, let them know about the Public Duty Doctrine. The police have no duty to help and the courts will be on their side.

May 25, 2008

Have you ever heard someone say "There is nothing you can do about it, this is just the way it is." The people who utter these ridiculous words feel better about themselves for doing nothing if they just continue believing them. There is nothing more pathetic or hopeless than an American citizen who will not stand up for their rights. They live in this perpetual state of believing that the government knows best. WAKE UP! They are human just like you, they were elected to their positions which in turn makes them civil servants. They are there to do as WE wish not to do what they think is best. The Constitution clearly states that we the people are the governing body not the men and women in Washington. So basically if you are doing nothing you are part of the problem, but if you wish to start fighting back, and help restore the Constitution and Bill Of Rights here is a good way to start. Find out how to contact your House and Senate representatives, and urge them to support these two bills. These two right restoring bills were introduced on March 8, 2007. They have been collecting dust ever since. Our congress must be made to listen. You are either part of the problem or part of the solution.......its your choice.

RESTORING THE CONSTITUTION ACT OF 2007 (H.R. 1415, S. 576)Ends indefinite detention. The RCA fixes the problems that the MCA caused in undermining the Constitution and the rule of law. It restores habeas corpus and due process at Guantanamo Bay and to other detainees held indefinitely by the federal government.Makes clear that the Constitution is the law of the land. The RCA stops any president from arbitrarily deciding who is an enemy combatant, ensures that no one will be prosecuted based on evidence literally beaten out of a witness and that no president can make up his or her own rules regarding torture and abuse.Ensures top government officials are held accountable. The bill makes sure that all felony torture and abuse can be prosecuted, even if the perpetrator is sitting in an office in Washington instead of serving as a private in the field.HABEAS CORPUS RESTORATION ACT (H.R. 1416, S. 185)Restores fundamental American values. The Habeas Corpus Restoration Act restores the constitutional due process right of habeas corpus that the Congress and the President took away with the Military Commissions Act.Protects against unlawful detention. When we have people who have been held without charge in Guantanamo Bay for more than five years, there is nothing more fundamental than letting a court decide whether their continued detention is lawful.

May 24, 2008

Here is what God says about Homosexuality. It is a abomination under the Lord. Only a man and a woman can get married. God made Adam and Eve not Adam And Steve.

Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. (Jude 1:7)

If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them. (Leviticus 20:13)The woman shall not wear that which pertaineth unto a man, neither shall a man put on a woman's garment: for all that do so are abomination unto the LORD thy God. (Deuteronomy 22:5)

Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband. (1 Corinthians 7:2)

California Court Strips Children of Right to Mother and Father By Terence P. JeffreyCNSNews.com Editor in ChiefMay 16, 2008

(CNSNews.com) - In Thursday's 4-3 decision legalizing same-sex marriage, the California Supreme Court stripped children of the right to be raised by a mother and a father.

Most of the media coverage of the California Supreme Court's decision has focused on the court's declaration that there is a right to same-sex marriage. The ruling invalidated California's Proposition 22, a state ballot initiative that passed with 61 percent of the vote in 2000, and which banned same-sex marriage in the state.

But the California Supreme Court decision goes beyond simply giving same-sex couples the right to call their unions a "marriage." It also strips children of the right not to be artificially conceived or adopted by people other than a mother and a father.

Indeed, the court does not recognize that children have any right whatsoever to a mother and a father.

In the decision, the California court sees children primarily through the eyes of same-sex couples who want to secure custody and control of children. The court makes emphatically clear that it deems this to be a right of same-sex couples that is equal to--and identical to--the right of married mothers and fathers to adopt or conceive and raise their own children.

In making this argument, the court addresses biological parenthood as an accident of nature that can be swept aside by the court in its pursuit of what the court understands to be justice. To explain this vision of justice--and where children fit into this vision--the court equates same-sex couples to infertile heterosexual married couples.

"A person who is physically incapable of bearing children still has the potential to become a parent and raise a child through adoption or through means of assisted reproduction, and the constitutional right to marry ensures the individual the opportunity to raise children in an officially recognized family with the person with whom the individual has chosen to share his or her life," the court said.

Two homosexual men joining together and contracting to have a child artificially conceived, gestated and handed over to their custody, it concludes, is a question of the "liberty and personal autonomy" of the homosexual men, but not of the child who would be so conceived and raised.

"Finally, of course, the ability to have children and raise them with a loved one who can share the joys and challenges of that endeavor is without doubt a most valuable component of one's liberty and personal autonomy," said the court.

"Although persons can have children and raise them outside of marriage," the court said, "the institution of civil marriage affords official governmental sanction and sanctuary to the family unit, granting a parent the ability to afford his or her children the substantial benefits that flow from a stable two-parent family environment, a ready and public means of establishing to others the legal basis of one's parental relationship to one's children and the additional security that comes from the knowledge that his or her parental relationship with a child will be afforded protection by the government against the adverse actions or claims of others."

In constructing its vision for a new type of "family," the court rhetorically worked its way around the biological certainty (in a pre-human-cloning world) that all children have a mother and father (whether they are ever afforded the right to know them or not), by adopting a parental lexicon that features not moms and dads but "opposite-sex couples" and "same-sex couples."

"Extending access to the designation of marriage to same sex couples will not deprive any opposite-sex couple or their children of any of the rights and benefits conferred by the marriage statutes, but simply will make the benefit of the marriage designation available to same-sex couples and their children," said the court.

"While retention of the limitation of marriage to opposite-sex couples is not needed to preserve the rights and benefits of opposite-sex couples," said the court, "the exclusion of same-sex couples from the designation of marriage works a real and appreciable harm upon same-sex couples and their children."

California Supreme Court Overturns Gay Marriage Ban

By Maura Dolan, Los Angeles Times Staff WriterMay 16, 2008

In a 4-3 decision, the justices rule that people have a fundamental 'right to marry' the person of their choice and that gender restrictions violate the state Constitution's equal protection guarantee

SAN FRANCISCO -- -- The California Supreme Court struck down the state's ban on same-sex marriage Thursday in a broadly worded decision that would invalidate virtually any law that discriminates on the basis of sexual orientation.

The 4-3 ruling declared that the state Constitution protects a fundamental "right to marry" that extends equally to same-sex couples. It tossed a highly emotional issue into the election year while opening the way for tens of thousands of gay people to wed in California, starting as early as mid-June.

The majority opinion, by Chief Justice Ronald M. George, declared that any law that discriminates on the basis of sexual orientation will from this point on be constitutionally suspect in California in the same way as laws that discriminate by race or gender, making the state's high court the first in the nation to adopt such a stringent standard.

The decision was a bold surprise from a moderately conservative, Republican-dominated court that legal scholars have long dubbed "cautious," and experts said it was likely to influence other courts around the country.

But the scope of the court's decision could be thrown into question by an initiative already heading toward the November ballot. The initiative would amend the state Constitution to prohibit same-sex unions.

The campaign over that measure began within minutes of the decision. The state's Catholic bishops and other opponents of same-sex marriage denounced the court's ruling. But Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who previously has vetoed two bills in favor of gay marriage, issued a statement saying he "respects" the decision and "will not support an amendment to the constitution that would overturn" it.

The ruling was greeted with loud cheering and whooping when it was released at the high court's headquarters here Thursday morning. About 100 people lined up outside to purchase copies of the decision for $10 apiece. Some people bought 10 to 15 copies, calling it a historic document. One man said he planned to give them out as Christmas presents.

Gay groups planned celebrations up and down the state.

"I can finally say I will be able to marry John, the man that I love," said Stuart Gaffney, one of the plaintiffs in the case, referring to his partner of 21 years, John Lewis. "Today is the happiest and most romantic day of our lives."

Conservative and religious-affiliated groups denounced the decision and pledged to bring enough voters to the polls in November to overturn it. Mathew Staver, founder of Liberty Counsel, called the decision "outrageous" and "nonsense."

"No matter how you stretch California's Constitution, you cannot find anywhere in its text, its history or tradition that now, after so many years, it magically protects what most societies condemn," Staver said.

The decision came after high courts in New York, Washington and New Jersey refused to extend marriage rights to gay couples. Only Massachusetts' top court has ruled in favor of permitting gays to wed.

The court's ruling repeatedly invoked the words "respect and dignity" and framed the marriage question as one that deeply affected not just couples but also their children. California has more than 100,000 households headed by gay couples, about a quarter with children, according to 2000 census data.

"Our state now recognizes that an individual's capacity to establish a loving and long-term committed relationship with another person and responsibly to care for and raise children does not depend upon the individual's sexual orientation," George wrote for the majority. "An individual's sexual orientation -- like a person's race or gender -- does not constitute a legitimate basis upon which to deny or withhold legal rights."

Many gay Californians said that even the state's broadly worded domestic partnership law provided only a second-class substitute for marriage. The court agreed.

Giving a different name, such as "domestic partnership," to the "official family relationship" of same-sex couples imposes "appreciable harm" both on the couples and their children, the court said.

The distinction might cast "doubt on whether the official family relationship of same-sex couples enjoys dignity equal to that of opposite-sex couples," George wrote, joined by Justices Joyce L. Kennard, Kathryn Mickle Werdegar and Carlos R. Moreno. All but Moreno were appointed by Republican governors. George was appointed by Gov. Pete Wilson in 1991.

The ruling cited a 60-year-old precedent that struck down a ban on interracial marriage in California.

The three dissenting justices argued that it was up to the electorate or the Legislature to decide whether gays should be permitted to marry.

In 2000, 61% of California voters approved a ballot measure, Proposition 22, that said "only marriage between a man and a woman is valid and recognized in California."

May 23, 2008

The CIA is protecting an Al-Qaeda linked terror group formerly headed by the alleged mastermind of 9/11 from being extradited to Iran according to an ABC News report, which also reveals that U.S. intelligence has been meeting and advising the group that has been blamed for bombings in Iran.As the London Telegraph reported last year, "The CIA is giving arms-length support, supplying money and weapons, to an Iranian militant group, Jundullah, which has conducted raids into Iran from bases in Pakistan."Jundullah is a Sunni Al-Qaeda offshoot terrorist group formerly headed by the alleged mastermind of 9/11, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, reported the Asia Times in 2004.The group also produces propaganda tapes and literature for al-Qaeda's media wing, As-Sahab, which is in turn closely affiliated with the military-industrial complex front IntelCenter, the group that makes available Al-Qaeda videos to the western media.IntelCenter was caught last year adding their logo to alleged Al-Qaeda tapes at the same time as the Al-Qaeda media brand, stoking suspicions that the Pentagon affiliated IntelCenter was directly releasing fake Al-Qaeda videos.Jundullah has been blamed for a number of bombings inside Iran aimed at destabilizing Ahmadinejad's government and is also active in Pakistan, having been fingered for its involvement in attacks on police stations and car bombings at the Pakistan-US Cultural Center in 2004."In another sign of growing tensions with the United States, Pakistan is threatening to turn over to Iran six members of a tribal militant group Iran claims are "spies" for the CIA," reports ABC News."The group, Jundullah, operates in Baluchistan on both sides of the border between Iran and Pakistan and has carried out a number of violent attacks on Iranian army facilities and officers inside the country.""The CIA has denied any direct ties with the group, but U.S. officials tell ABC News U.S. intelligence officers frequently meet and advise Jundullah leaders, and current and former intelligence officers are working to prevent the men from being sent to Iran."The fact that the highest echelons of the U.S. intelligence apparatus are meeting, advising and funding Sunni Al-Qaeda groups as a means of facilitating terrorist bombings and regime change in Iran completely invalidates the "war on terror" as a fabled fraud and renders ludicrous Bush administration rhetoric about fighting Al-Qaeda cells in Iraq.Neo-Cons drooling at the prospect of an invasion of Iran have hardly been shy about their support of terror attacks aimed against Iran by means of Jundullah, MEK and other groups listed as terror organizations by the State Department.Ret. Gen. Thomas McInerney, who was part of the Pentagon's "message force multipliers" propaganda program, recently called for the Bush administration to commit acts of terror in Iran on Fox News.In November 2007, Fox and Friends host Brian Kilmeade openly called for US support for acts of terrorism, such as car bombings, in Tehran. Colonel David Hunt, who has over 29 years of military experience including extensive operational experience in Special Operations, Counter Terrorism and Intelligence Operations, agreed with Kilmeade, stating "absolutely" in response to Kilmead's question about whether cars should start blowing up in Tehran.

$12.8 billion offer may say another piece of U.S. sold off to foreign investors

The Pennsylvania Turnpike may soon be more aptly referred to as the Barcelona Turnpike if a $12.8 billion proposal by a Spanish toll road operator is approved by the Pennsylvania Legislature.

Pennsylvania Governor Edward Rendell made the announcement yesterday that Abertis Infraestructuras, of Barcelona won the right to operate the turnpike on a 75-year lease.

In making the largest bid ever for the private operation of a U.S. toll road, Abertis partnered with a subsidiary of U.S. investment bank Citigroup, and Spanish investment firm Criteria CaixaCorp, reports the Philadelphia Inquirer.

The next-highest bid was $12.1 billion by New York's Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Transurban Group, Australia's second-largest toll-road operator.

"This bid will allow us to increase spending on roads, bridges and transit above what is in the current plan, Act 44, which includes plans to tolls I-80,'' Rendell said at a press conference in Harrisburg. "This is a very good deal.''

If the deal goes ahead, the Abertis/Citi consortium would also secure the right to raise tolls 25 percent next year and 2.5 percent or the rate of inflation every consecutive year. This would translate as an increase from $22.75 to travel 358 miles on the turnpike now, to at least $36.40 within a decade.

This is not the first time Rendell has attempted to lease the 537-mile (864-kilometer) turnpike. Last year saw a move to instigate a lease deal before the plans were eventually scuppered due to opposition from the Legislature. In response, Rendell signed into law Act 44, and began the much maligned "I-80 Project" which allowed the state to establish tolls on the 311-mile I-80. The I-80 Project, which has not yet gained federal approval, is expected to be scrapped should the Turnpike deal go ahead.

Legislative approval for the deal is expected to take months and much opposition from lawmakers is anticipated.

(Article continues below) In recent years the Bush administration has overseen a policy of selling off key U.S. infrastructure to the highest bidder - in most cases foreign owned corporations. Virginia's Pocahontas Parkway and a Texas toll road from Austin to Sequin are just two of the roads to have been siphoned off to foreign companies who will all enjoy billions in profits from American citizens forced to pay the tolls, while others will be thrown off their land and have their property revoked without just compensation following the trend of recent eminent domain rulings.

2004 saw the management of the Chicago Skyway, a stretch of elevated road connecting I-90 and I-94, granted to Cintra, another Spanish operation that outbid Abertis at $1.83 billion. Abertis lost out to Cintra again when the Indiana Toll Road was taken over in 2006 for $3.85 billion.

Cintra, which in turn is owned by the King of Spain Juan Carlos, now has leases to operate the two roads for 99 and 75 years respectively. Cintra and it's partner Macquarie lost out on the Pennsylvania Turnpike as it registered a bid of just $8.1 billion.

Cintra/Macquarie also owns the contract for The Texas Department of Transportation's Trans Texas Corridor superhighway, a key link in the proposed internationalization of America's highway systems into a NAFTA Super Highway that many, including U.S. representatives, have warned would facilitate a move towards a North American Union.

Last year Macquarie agreed to buy dozens of newspapers in Texas and Oklahoma that had been harsh critics of the Trans Texas Corridor and were shedding light on the wider NAFTA highway agenda.

The Pennsylvania Turnpike is a key part of the infrastructure of the proposed Atlantic Corridor, one of four transport channels being promoted by coalitions of interest under the NAFTA umbrella.

The leases for these roads are being made possible through "public-private partnerships" (PPP's), now under the stewardship of the secretive Security and Prosperity Partnership, which operates without Congressional oversight.

Essentially Government-sanctioned monopolies, PPP's are contracts between public agencies and private entities that enable private sector participation in public amenities such as roads, highways, transit routes, airports, pipelines, railways and train stations, river canal systems and port facilities, telecommunications networks and teleports.

The PPP's will seemingly expand to whatever the public owns – waste management, public parking facilities, even lotteries and sports stadiums. The USA is literally up for sale.

Former World Bank economist and Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz, has stated that the process of foreign corporations buying up U.S. infrastructure is part of the globalization endgame, where the America literally goes into receivership to other countries.

HIGH GRASS Artie Timberlake of the Canton Street Department mows grass at 717 Sylvan Ct. NE on Tuesday. Repeat violators of Canton's high-grass law would face jail time if a proposed amendment passes. Council is expected to vote on the legislation Monday.REPOSITORY BOB ROSSITERCANTON The city of Canton has been compared to communists, fascists and terrorists in response to a proposed law that sends repeat violators of the city's high-grass law to jail.

The legislation has drawn the ire and scorn of people as far away as Tulsa, New Orleans, North Carolina, and Sydney, Australia. A Repository story in Tuesday's edition about the plan generated heavy traffic on the newspaper's Web site and triggered scores of e-mail from people outside the area who say it's a blatant example of over-reaching and liberty-infringing government.

One e-mail was titled: "Sounds like Russia to me." Another reader was equally harsh, asking, "Where do they find these Hitlerian morons? 30 days in jail? Something has gone very wrong in this country. What a joke!"

"Putting people in jail for tall grass sounds like an act of terrorism to me," wrote an attorney from Louisiana.

City Council is expected to vote Monday on a proposed amendment to make a second violation of the city's weed and high grass law, a fourth-degree misdemeanor, punishable by a fine of up to $250 and up to 30 days in jail. Existing city law already makes a first-time violation a minor misdemeanor, which carries a fine of up to $150 and no jail time. The existing law — and the proposed amendment — also apply to litter on the lots.

CITY RESPONDS

City officials say they would rather not bother with mowing high grass, because it sucks up time and taxpayer money. But severely overgrown lots — with grass and weeds ranging from around 12 inches to sometimes 4 feet high — drag down city neighborhoods, said Mark Adams, director of environmental health for the city health department.

"We're not after a home in which grandpa had a heart attack and the grass is a little too tall," Law Director Joseph Martuccio said. "This (proposed law is) designed to deter repeat offenders, those who have already been given due process by the city and the bill, and then have subsequently been convicted by a court of law the first time on a minor misdemeanor."

"We're driven by complaints from the neighbors to get these neighborhoods cleaned up," said Councilman Greg Hawk, D-1, a strong proponent of the legislation. "The good neighbors who live next to these vacant lots ... mow their yards (and) they don't want to live next to houses where the grass and weeds are knee-high."

At a council committee meeting Monday night, Martuccio said it may be unlikely that a judge would sentence a repeat high grass violator to jail, unless the judge wants to set an example to deter other violators.

E-MAIL FIRESTORM

Helping drive the avalanche of responses was the posting of the newspaper story on various Web sites, most notably the popular Drudge Report, which wrote its own headline on the article: "City vows to jail people who don't mow lawns."

A reader e-mailed this warning: "Small laws are pieced together into huge tyrannies." At least 40 e-mails streamed in, including one praising Canton: "What a great idea! How about we make this a national law! I wish Broken Arrow and Tulsa, (Okla.) had this same attitude towards property neglect."

'Deplorable condition'

The city's intent is not to patrol city streets and measure yards with rulers to check if grass exceeds the city's existing 8-inch limit, said Service Director Thomas Bernabei. "It's grass which is extraordinarily noticeable," he said — "A foot or two longer than the average lot," with many lots in "deplorable condition."

Martuccio agreed. "This is definitely for repeat offenders who pose a safety threat to their neighbors by having the potential for rodents or hidden cans, for example, that a child might fall on and get cut while they're playing."

Increasing the potential punishment is also designed to cut the city's grass-cutting costs on noncity lots, Martuccio said. Hawk said the money would be better spent on hiring police officers and firefighters.

The average overgrown lot costs the property owner $100 per mowing, including labor and equipment costs and a $35 administrative fee, said Kevin Monroe, street superintendent.

VACANT LOTS

Reinforcing the existing law is focused on vacant lots and lots with abandoned houses, Bernabei said. The city cuts about 2,000 noncity-owned lots a year deemed to have excessively high grass, many "way over" 12 inches in height, said Adams of the Health Department. A handful of those lots have owner-occupied homes, he estimated. Twelve of the lot owners are dead. The owners of about 1,100 of the lots have city mailing addresses, Adams said, and about 1,500 are owned by individuals. Banks and corporations own some lots.

Violation notices and bills sent in the mail often get ignored, according to city officials. Tax liens also are filed, Hawk said. The city is considering seeking court judgments to collect the money, he said.

As for Canton being compared to Russia, Adams replied, "If you think this is Russia, don't bother coming into Canton, don't bother coming into a city (with people) who want to live in a sensible and reasonable community."

"It is our policy to remove anyone who becomes disruptive, whether they are media or not," Arulanandam said.

Several off-duty police officers working security for the event escorted the four men, including Deitz, from the property.

Three of the officers are employed by Louisville Metro Corrections, said Tom Campbell, corrections director. They were not on duty at the time and their names were not released. A written report on the incident was not available yesterday, but Campbell said it began when members of We Are Change were asked to stop taping at the North event and refused.

"Our officers were asked to escort them off the property," Campbell said.

At some point during the incident, Campbell said, his officers were asked by either NRA security staff or North's security team to confiscate the video footage for their review. Campbell said his officers complied.

Arulanandam said, however, at no time did anyone with the NRA ask for the video footage.

"No one from the NRA requested that their footage be seized," Arulanandam said. "And when we found out, we asked for the footage to be returned."

Deitz tells a different story.

He said his crew politely asked their questions of North, including one about the Iran-contra affair, a political scandal in the mid-1980s in which the United States secretly sold weapons to Iran and sent some of the proceeds to rebel groups in Nicaragua. As the We Are Change people were leaving, Deitz said they were accosted by a security team.

"They just threatened us with everything," he said.

Deitz said his group, which has chapters throughout the country, is trying to question government corruption. Their Web site indicates they have been calling for further investigation into what happened in the Sept. 11 attacks.

"We're out there trying to show the corruption and the evils our government is involved in," Deitz said.

For the past several days, Deitz said, he has been trying to get the video footage back. He said four memory cards and several batteries were taken.

After the incident, the corrections officers turned over the footage to an Audubon Park Police Department officer who also was working off-duty, said Sgt. Keith Ferriell of the Audubon Park police.

That officer was told that the NRA security wanted to review the footage, but they never did, Ferriell said. He did not name the officer.

The Audubon Park officer logged the footage into the property room at police headquarters, where it has remained, Ferriell said.

Yesterday, Ferriell said he consulted with metro corrections and was told that no criminal charges were going to be filed against Deitz or the other men so the footage could be returned.

Ferriell said a letter will be sent to We Are Change telling them how to can get their property back.

Reporter Jessie Halladay can be reached at (502) 582-4081.

WeAreChange Assaulted by Police in Louisville

source: wearechangeohio.com

Members of WeAreChange were physically removed from the Louisville Exposition Center on Sunday after confronting Iran Contra figure Oliver North. Members questioned North on his involvement with Continuity of Government, the need for a new 9/11 investigation and concentration camps in America.

Lt. Colonel Oliver North, a FOX News host, was confronted by a combination of activists from WeAreChange Ohio and Kentuckiana Change. Cody Deeds stood up during a question and answer session and asked North to explain exactly what the Continuity of Government was, at which point North went into his involvement with REX 84 during the Reagan Administration. North explained that at the time it was a plan to continue the government in the event of a Soviet attack. As a follow-up question, Deeds asked, "Given the knowledge of secondary devices in [World Trade Center] building 7, would you support a new investigation of 9/11.” North initially scoffed at the notion of government involvement, but Deeds reiterated that he had not mentioned the government and only wanted know if given knowledge of secondary devices, would he support a new investigation. At which point, North replied, “Investigate everything."

On North’s way out of the forum, Sam Logulo asked North about the Iran Contra hearings and the presence of concentration camps in America. North claimed that American concentration camps were shut down after World War II. Logulo replied, “Some of them are being reopened," at which North responded, “show me the proof.” Logulo specifically mentioned the suburban town of Beech Grove, outside of Indianapolis. North told Logulo to send the evidence to his email address.

On the way out, the members gave a variety of DVDs including TerrorStorm and Blueprint for Truth to North. In addition, the members gave a Patriots Question 9/11 flier to North and an article about ex-Congressman Daniel Hamburg regarding evidence that the U.S. government created Al-Qaeda and was involved in 9/11.

Later, Logulo told North that he would send him the information on the camps, but at this point, police surrounded the WeAreChange members. The officers told the members to shut off their cameras. Adam Covington from Kentuckiana Change asked an officer, “Why can’t I record this when I have a press pass, and this is a second and first amendment venue?” Despite the lack of explanation from the police, the members shut off their devices and proceeded to walk out of the building.

While being escorted out, a plainclothes officer yelled “Give me your camera,” and tried to snatch Logulo's camera from behind. Four officers tackled Logulo, and drove him to the ground. One officer put Logulo into a headlock.

“Easy, easy, easy!” Logulo exclaimed. “I’m not resisting.”

As Logulo was being assaulted, Deeds was filming his fellow WeAreChange member in order to record the abuse. He was told to stop filming at which point he did not comply and continued filming anyway.

“Get him!” yelled a plainclothes officer as he ran at Deeds. Three officers took Deeds down to his knees as they ripped the camera out of his hand. Deeds tried to take the memory stick out of his camera, and was accused of “tampering with evidence,” a Class D felony according to officer Rehm. Deeds later explained, “The footage was my only defense.”

The police confiscated four memory cards, two battery packs, two sets of batteries, and a disc. Throughout the thirty minute ordeal, the members of Change were interrogated, harassed, and searched. To prevent further harassment at future events, members have stated that they would appreciate any attorneys that would provide their support. All attorneys may contact Cody Deeds at WeAreChangeOhio.com.

If you would like to see the video footage, call the Louisville Metro Police at (502) 574-7111 or write: